📉 How the 2nd Worst Bank Failure Affects Real Estate:

What’s driving the news: On Friday (March 10th), Silicon Valley Bank was insolvent after a mass panic caused the largest bank run in history. $4 billion in withdrawals an hour turned into the 2nd largest bank to fail in US history.

What happened: SVB’s massive mistake was caused by taking too much cash and buy mortgage bonds that only offered a slightly higher rate of return. But that locked up their money for significantly longer.

This was a change from their previous strategy and dried up liquidity.

But is everything okay? On Sunday (March 12th), the US government announced that they would be “backstopping all deposits.” Backing depositors’ funds means anyone with frozen money will get access to their funds.

This avoided a potential economic catastrophe, waves of missed payroll, and a likely extinction event for thousands of startups. And what could have been a decade's worth of innovation lost.

For now. The US hasn’t raised interest rates this rapidly in the modern economy. We don’t know what else will break. SVB could be a one-off or the canary in the coal mine for more to come.

Why this matters: As a result of the SVB collapse, the Fed is under pressure to prevent a deeper economic disaster and may need to pause rate hikes. So mortgage rates could drop sooner than expected this year…

This is both good and bad news for buyers.

The good news is that it will make buying affordable.

The bad news is that lower rates increase demand, which will increase competition, and then place upward pressure on home prices.

But if we see sustained inflation in the February CPI number, it could force the Fed to continue hiking rates.

We'll have to watch on March 22 to see what happens. Stay tuned.

If you want the deep dive on SVB.

🚧 Coming Soon - Pasco’s 2025 Strategic Plan:

Why this matters: The Pasco Board of County Commissioners released their 2022-2025 plan, which they spent 18 months working on to guide their actions & activities in Pasco County.

Pasco is one of Florida's fastest-growing counties, 15th in the state. As a result, we need to improve our infrastructure, jobs, transportation, urban design, fiscal policies, education, public safety, and other quality of life & social details.

But instead of boring you with details that don’t matter let’s talk about some of the upcoming projects and developments that will have a significant impact on Pasco County in the next decade.

So what’s next:

• Moffitt Cancer Center begins strategies to fill its 14,000 jobs for Speros – its 775-acre campus, currently Pasco ranch land about to be transformed.

• 996-acre Pasco Town Center will be a center for job creation and will continue to cement Pasco as a distribution hub. The 4.5 million square feet of industrial space will have buildings ranging from as small as 130,000 square feet up to 1.6 million square feet. The property is also entitled for up to 3,500 apartments and 500,000 square feet of retail but will likely lean more towards industrial use.

• Urban development in Wiregrass Ranch includes Orlando Health which will break ground on its $100M first phase soon. They’re still in talks with Raymond James, but Florida Cancer Specialists will build a $40 million, 60,000-square-foot facility to employ 240 people. There are also other big users close on deals. Wiregrass is entitled to 6 million square feet for office and medical office, 2.7 million for retail, and more than 1,000 hospital beds.

• NorthPoint Development, based in Kansas City, paid $59 million for 170 acres in the northeast quadrant of the interchange. That site will be home to a 1.4 million-square-foot Target Corp fulfillment center.

• One of the first major goals & initiatives is to develop multi-model transportation to improve choices and reduce congestion.

There’s a huge bet being made by the county:

The bottom line: This is ultimately great news because new job opportunities, better infrastructure, and new developments will improve the quality of life for everyone & your home value- and this is just in Pasco. Ff you’ve read previous issues, then you know they have a lot of new projects coming to Tampa Bay-St. Pete as well.

So if there’s one thing we can be confident about is the long-term outlook of the Tampa Bay area.

If you want to read more about the strategic plan, here’s the website.

☘️ Coming this Weekend - More than St. Patrick’s Day:

What’s driving the news: Even though Tampa’s Riverwalk turning green is the major highlight of Tampa Bay this weekend, the Valspar Championship on Saturday and Taste of South Tampa are also catching headlines.

The details:

• The City of Tampa’s annual River O’Green celebration and most of its festivities will start at 11am in Curtis Hixon Park. Here’s a list of 30+ other events happening in the Tampa Bay area.

• The Valspar Championship, Tampa Bay’s PGA Tour Event returns this weekend running now through March 19, and held on the Copperhead Course at Innisbrook Resort in Palm Harbor. With celebrity appearances like Rob Gronkowski (Friday) & Rondé Barber, and Darius Rucker will perform at the end of the day Saturday.